


Such English Creatures

by alicekittridge



Category: Killing Eve (TV 2018)
Genre: Explicit Sexual Content, F/F, Light Bondage, Oneshot, POV Third Person, Present Tense, some violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-18
Updated: 2019-01-18
Packaged: 2019-10-12 10:01:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,061
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17465396
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alicekittridge/pseuds/alicekittridge
Summary: Villanelle with other people, Villanelle with Eve.





	Such English Creatures

**Author's Note:**

  * For [viagiordano](https://archiveofourown.org/users/viagiordano/gifts).



> A tag worth mentioning, as suggested by Dani: Five Times Villanelle Avoids Clamydia. (Thank you Dani; you're wonderful!)
> 
> This is a Christmas gift for viagiordano/Dani that I'm posting almost a month later because I finished it late. I hope you all enjoy it too; it was quite fun to write these different scenarios.
> 
> Now back to the WIPs...  
> \--------------------------  
> This work could best be summarized as: Porn with a little bit of plot and a sprinkle of angst and melancholy

**LONDON**

“This is my studio,” the woman, Rebecca, is saying, flicking on the bright lights inside her expensive apartment, revealing a spacious but crowded room filled with colorful canvases, half-finished artwork and many sketches, different kinds of paint, brushes of all sizes, easels, paint stands, and other things that are useful in this profession. It’s like walking into her brain, Villanelle thinks, taking in all the art. There are landscapes—lavender fields in France, parts of the Alps that Villanelle recognizes from various trips to Italy, a forest from Switzerland—and portraits of people in different places, some of them fully clothed, others completely naked.

            “It’s a little messy,” Rebecca continues apologetically, “but… here it is.”

            “I’m impressed,” Villanelle says, not lying in the slightest. She always admired people who had the patience for art, who could sit down in a cramped and stuffy studio for hours and work on one section of something until the artist was satisfied with it. She studies the nudes, which are partially covered by a sheet. They appear to be in oil, and are mostly of men, but there are women too, and Villanelle notes a particular focus on the eyes, or the hair, or the tender underside of a breast. She says, “I hope this isn’t some sort of ploy to get me to take my clothes off.”

            Rebecca laughs from somewhere behind her. “It isn’t, but you’re welcome to. You’d have to pay me by the hour, though.”

            “Oh,” Villanelle turns around, “is that how it is for you?” She strides to Rebecca, trapping her against a smooth, paint-splattered plaster wall. The splatters look like strange, multi-colored blood. “Is that just for your art?”

            “Are you offering to pay me for something else?”

            “Are you?” Villanelle counters gently. “You paint your subjects, and then you seduce them? Take them on the floor right there?” She bobs her head in the direction of an empty space. Rebecca swallows, and Villanelle smiles. “I’m right, aren’t I?”

            “It’s horribly unprofessional,” Rebecca says, voice suddenly stern, but it’s shaking, almost breathy. It puffs pleasantly in Villanelle’s face, smelling like the dessert they’d helped themselves to a mere hour ago. “It’s…” She trails off, dark blue eyes on Villanelle’s mouth.

            “It’s what?” Villanelle says, cupping her face, dragging a thumb over Rebecca’s full lower lip. “Hot?” She presses that thumb between Rebecca’s teeth, absorbing her intake of breath when she strokes Rebecca’s tongue. “You get off on the power imbalance, don’t you?” Villanelle murmurs. “Some of them look young. Are they students in your master’s class?”

            Rebecca Iverson is a professor of fine art at Oxford University and has been teaching for fifteen years. She’s forty-three and dirty-blonde, a few inches shorter than Villanelle, with lovely curves. Villanelle met her yesterday, at a showing, but hasn’t been able to get her alone until now, and she lets her free hand slide under Rebecca’s sweater until she’s cupping a soft hip. Desire flares up in her gut at the touch and she wants this woman naked underneath her, arching into her.

            “They are,” Rebecca answers after a long moment, around Villanelle’s thumb.

            “Do you have crushes on them?” Villanelle goes back to tracing her mouth.

            “What?”

            “Don’t be daft, Rebecca.”

            The Englishwoman groans, then, her eyes squeezing shut. “God, _yes_. Yes, I’ve had crushes.”

            “And are they reciprocated?” Villanelle slides her other hand higher until her fingers brush the cup of Rebecca’s bra.

            Rebecca nods feverishly. “I-I make sure they are,” she breathes.

            “You fuck them, then?”

            Rebecca is silent.

            Villanelle tries a different tactic. She forces the hand that’d been at Rebecca’s mouth into her slacks and pushes against her, feeling the dampness of her underwear, absorbing Rebecca’s moan of surprise. “Do you fuck them?” she repeats, keeping her voice soft, not wanting to frighten her.

            “Yes,” Rebecca whispers. Her face is red and Villanelle thinks it’s with both shame and arousal. Her hips are already moving against Villanelle’s hand.

            “It happens.”

            A laugh. “You’ve slept with a professor, then?”

            “A few times. Why do you like it?” She strokes Rebecca with her thumb and her hips twitch.

            “Fuck,” Rebecca says. “Fuck, it’s… exciting.”

            “Makes you feel younger, doesn’t it?” And Villanelle kisses her, sighing into it, slipping tongue into it. She enjoys kissing when it’s from women. She likes how soft their lips are, how, with some women, kissing turns them on more. “Makes you feel you can orgasm till you faint?”

            “Oh god…”

            “Or is it the other way around?” Villanelle whispers. “Are you one of those people fascinated by someone else’s ecstasy?”

            “Both,” Rebecca breathes. “Definitely both.” Her hand finds Villanelle’s wrist and she tries to get her to do something else, but Villanelle refuses. “You’re torturing me,” Rebecca says, head falling back against the wall, exposing her throat. Villanelle kisses the skin there, nibbles it, sucks bruises into it.

            “I’m fascinated by this,” Villanelle says. “And I like to think I’m doing your students a favor.”

            “What… do you mean?”

            “I think you go slow with them sometimes. Paint them slowly when you know they fancy you, draw out every moment until they’re shifting uncomfortably and you can see their want.” She slides her hand into Rebecca’s underwear until she meets warm wetness, stifling a groan. “And when you have them underneath you, you do what I’m doing to you now, don’t you?”

            She feels the vibration of Rebecca’s whimper against her lips.

            “Say it, Rebecca,” Villanelle says, “and I will give you what you want.”

            Silence, save for labored breathing.

            Villanelle pulls away and finds that Rebecca has closed her eyes. There’s a look of fight on her face and oh it stings, for Anna had worn that mask many, many times. “No?” Villanelle questions. “Nothing?”

            More silence.

            Villanelle hums and retracts her hand. She brings her shining fingers to her mouth and licks them noisily clean. “I guess you don’t want this, then.”

            Suddenly there is a firm grip on her wrist, pulling her violently forward, and her teeth crash with Rebecca’s when their mouths collide. Villanelle groans, takes Rebecca’s sweater in her fists and the other woman pushes against her. Villanelle pushes back, tugs Rebecca to the right and spins her around and forces her to the floor. A few paint tubes scatter when she lands, clattering to a halt somewhere in the shadows.

            “Oh, you think you’re in control of this, do you?” Villanelle says. Rebecca is panting, her face red, a sheen of sweat visible on her forehead. “Take off your clothes.”

            Rebecca obeys, her jaw tight.

            “You’re not ever naked with them, are you, Rebecca?”

            “N-No.”

            “Self-conscious?”

            Silence. She strips quickly, kicks her clothes to the side, visibly nervous and yet not even bothering to cover herself up. She’s lovely, Villanelle thinks, taking in the curves, the fairer skin of her upper legs and stomach and chest, her full breasts.

            “You shouldn’t be,” Villanelle says, crouching now to untie her boots. “Your body is very nice.” And so is the look on Rebecca’s face. It’s one of confusion, of disbelief, for how dare someone turn the tables on her, how dare someone young enough to be her fucking master’s student take away her power.

            Villanelle doesn’t undress fully, leaving herself in underwear; it’s enough to feel Rebecca against her. It’s probably what Rebecca does too, or even just takes her pants off, when it’s her male students, enough for them to glimpse her before she takes them inside her. Maybe she’s different with her female students in some way, but they’re always exposed, and she studies them through painting them and then on top of them, staring even after she’s made them come.

            “Lie back,” Villanelle says.

            Rebecca obeys, says, “It’s cold.”

            Villanelle straddles her, kisses her, runs her thumbs over hard nipples, pinches them until Rebecca is moaning and arching slightly. There’s an intense ache between her own thighs—but, she notes, nothing compared to the one that’d been there whenever she was near Eve—and for a moment she’s tempted to just sit astride Rebecca’s face, take care of it, leave her hanging and desperate and naked on her own floor but she wants to fuck her spineless.

            “You ruin your students, don’t you, Rebecca? Like they’re held captive for an evening, bending to your will with their consent?”

            Rebecca is cursing softly now, and her chest is heaving, as if she’s in the middle of running a marathon. She whispers, “A-Are you… getting revenge on… my students’ behalf?”

            Villanelle slides down, takes a nipple between her teeth, says, “I wouldn’t call it revenge. It usually involves blood.” She slides lower, kisses across Rebecca’s soft stomach, her hips, up the insides of her thighs. When she puts her mouth against Rebecca she’s met with such wetness that her lips and tongue slide easily, almost clumsily, and she moans, pulls away, breathes, “I knew you’d get off on this.” Hands find Villanelle’s hair but she grasps Rebecca’s wrists and pushes them away. “You think you can touch me?”

            “Oh god.” It’s a moan.

            “I didn’t say you could.” Villanelle stands, wanders around the bright studio in search of something to bind Rebecca’s hands together. She settles for her own belt, binding Rebecca’s wrists above her head.

            “Shit,” Rebecca whispers. “Shit. What’re you doing?”

            “Taking you,” replies Villanelle, and settles herself between Rebecca’s legs.

 

**PARIS**

Her latest affair is a professor of dance at a private school in Kent. She’s here with her dancers, preparing for a performance at the Paris Opera House, and at the moment, those dancers think she’s getting shut-eye at her hotel when in reality she’s in Villanelle’s hotel bathroom, sitting primly on the vanity stool with her bright eyes turned away from Villanelle, drifting anywhere but at the deep soaker tub.

            “It’s not good,” says Karin Appleby at last, “that we’re together like this.”

            Villanelle pauses in her shaving, the razor hovering over the delicate skin of her ankle. “Are you worried about professionalism?”

            “Shouldn’t you be, Freja?”

            Villanelle sees Karin shake her blonde head out of the corner of her eye.

            Karin continues, “Do you know what a fucking scandal this would cause?”

            “Oh, boo-hoo. You think I care?” Villanelle finishes her ankle, lets her foot slip back into the soapy water so she can rinse it off. “You’re here already. That says something.”

            “Only because you forced me.”

            Villanelle scoffs. She plucks the drain and stands and it’s the moment Karin turns her entire body away from her. “I thought you wanted to have fun, Karin. Isn’t that what you said at dinner?”

            “I didn’t mean… whatever the fuck this is.” Her voice is tense. And the hand on her knee is tightening.

            “What did you think we’d do?” Villanelle asks, wrapping herself in the standard-issue robe without toweling off. “Stay at the table and make small talk?” She approaches Karin but doesn’t set a hand on her shoulder. There’s a gap between her silk shirt and her pinned-up hair and Villanelle wants to press her lips to it, sink her teeth into it, preferably while Karin is in the middle of orgasm.

            “I’m married,” Karin says. The ring on her finger glistens in the bright bathroom light.

            “I don’t care.”

            “Obviously not.”

            “I don’t think you do either, else you wouldn’t be sitting on my stool, in my bathroom,” she lets her fingers grace that exposed skin, “your back turned to me.” Goosebumps follow her touch. Villanelle lowers her voice, “Are you afraid of what you’d feel if you turned around?” God that skin is soft and from this distance Villanelle can smell Karin’s floral perfume, a sweet but light smell. She’d taste it on her tongue, along with salt. “Are you afraid of being with someone almost twenty years younger than you?” She strokes the fine hair at the base of Karin’s skull. It’s darker there, and silky, and the movement makes Karin shiver but the other woman quickly tenses, trying to resist. “Men do it all the time, you know, and nobody says shit.”

            “I’m aware,” Karin says hotly.

            Villanelle laughs. “Oh, you are so spicy, Karin.” It’s sent heat into her gut. “Won’t you let me cool you down?” She puts both hands on Karin’s shoulders, lets her fingers drag up the exposed gap, up her neck, until they reach the clip holding Karin’s hair up. Karin neither accepts nor rejects the action, only stays still, and Villanelle takes it as consent. Karin’s wavy locks float around her neck, the undersides a darker blonde, the tops almost white, reminding Villanelle of how much older this woman actually is. (Forty-five. Just a year younger than Eve.) The slow placement of Karin’s hair to one side reminds Villanelle of Eve too, of the night she’d slipped the dress from Eve’s body and ran her eyes over it while her fingers tingled from Eve’s smooth, wet shoulders. She sinks to her knees on the marble tile, the better to even their height, and leans close to Karin until she’s sure the other woman can feel her breath. She murmurs, “Don’t you want to have sex with me?” And she presses her mouth to the curve of Karin’s shoulder, just above the collar of her shirt.

            “Why are you doing this?” Karin asks shakily.

            “I think you’re lonely,” Villanelle says. “And your husband sounds like an arsehole.” She kisses higher, inhaling as she does so, her gut coiling pleasantly at the sweet smell that greets her. “He might be sleeping with someone else. And if that’s the case,” she takes Karin’s earlobe between her teeth, feeling her sharp intake of breath, “who says you shouldn’t too?”

            One of Karin’s hands darts back and grips part of Villanelle’s robe and she stops for a moment, worried Karin will tell her to fuck off, but instead that hand tugs insistently at her and Villanelle walks forward on her knees, which have begun to ache, until she’s kneeling in front of Karin, seeing eye-to-eye. Her eyes are a lovely blue, something out of Norse mythology, if she had to make a comparison.

            “Are you going to let me have you?” Villanelle murmurs, cupping Karin’s face in her hands. “It’s why you’re here, Karin. Don’t think I don’t know.” Her cheeks are soft and Villanelle can feel the texture of her makeup. “You can stop fighting it.” Their faces are separated by inches now. “You can kiss me,” Villanelle whispers, “if you want to.”

            Karin expels a shaky breath and closes the distance with surprising quickness; her kisses are soft and insistent, confirming just what Villanelle had thought. She’s lonely, her husband is probably absent, and if she hasn’t done this in a while, Karin is probably too afraid to go out and find it elsewhere while her husband has stupid confidence to do just that.

            The kiss becomes clumsy and Karin grips the side of the stool for balance.

            Eventually Villanelle pulls away to ask, “Can I undress you?”

            “Yes,” Karin says. “Yes, you can.”

            And as she removes each piece of clothing and kisses the exposed skin with steady lips, Villanelle sighs, for _this_ is why she prefers women; their softness, their scent, discovering their sensitive places, is addicting, and there’s some enjoyment to be gained. Karin is beautiful when dressed and beautiful when undressed and yet that damn voice in the back of Villanelle’s head says _But is she Eve?_

Villanelle kisses her thighs, her insides soaring at how desperate Karin’s breathing gets the closer she gets to her.

            “Fuck,” Karin says.

            “You’ll like it,” Villanelle assures her, “I promise.” She puts a leg over her shoulder and gently grips Karin’s thighs and, softly, licks her. It earns a gasp, and a moan, and a hand moving from the side of the stool and into her hair. She picks up the pace, taking in Karin’s enjoyment, the way her head is thrown back, the crease between her brows that only gets more prominent the closer she gets to climax. Villanelle slips fingers inside and Karin bites her lip, trapping a sound, and Villanelle takes her mouth away to scold her. “Don’t do that.”

            “Sorry…” Karin says.

            “I want to hear you. I don’t care what you sound like.”

            Karin smiles up at the ceiling. “That’s… a relief.”

            “Your husband doesn’t like it?”

            Karin shakes her head. “He thinks I-I’m too… loud.”

            Villanelle goes back in, sucking at her, picking up the pace, unable to keep her own pleasure to herself. She doesn’t know if that’s what sends Karin over the edge or her ministrations. Karin curls into her, cursing, her moans reverberating off the bathroom walls. Villanelle watches her body twitch while she strokes her through aftershocks, and once Karin slumps in the stool she pulls gently out and stands to kiss her.

            “Not too loud at all,” she says against Karin’s mouth. “Your husband’s an arse for thinking that.” Another kiss, and then she steps away to lick her fingers clean. “Get on my bed.”

            Three rounds in and, close to midnight, when she’s taking Karin from behind, she makes good on the thought of sinking her teeth into the curve of Karin’s shoulder. When she wakes up in the morning and studies her reflection in the mirror, it’ll be a good bruise, something to explain to her husband when she gets back to Brighton, or something to cover up completely.

**BERLIN**

“Are you going to take my picture?”

            Angela Leighton rolls her eyes. “Not if you keep asking. How old did you say you were again?”

            Villanelle pouts. “You wound me. I paid for your dinner.”

            “You did,” Angela agrees, squinting against the sunlight to see the picture on her camera’s screen, “and it was kind of you, but it was a one-time thing.”

            “Why did you ask me to come with you then?”

            At this, Angela is silent. She attaches a different lens hood to her camera before stuffing it quickly into her bag. Then, “I don’t know.”

            “Are you hoping I’ll come back home with you?” Villanelle asks.

            “Actually,” says Angela firmly, “I’m in the mood for ice cream.”

            Villanelle scoffs, and then she shrugs. “Okay. Let’s go then.”

            Angela Leighton is thirty-nine, originally from London, and if Villanelle is honest with herself, she’s the youngest woman she’s been with in a while. Angela is in the process of earning a doctorate’s degree at Humboldt, and she teaches photography on the side but not at the university. She has a studio downtown where she hosts her classes. Villanelle had researched both things, out of curiosity, and somehow stumbled upon her email address. It was easy enough to hack into her account, and aside from professional emails from both workplaces and emails back and forth between various professors regarding degree things, there were several correspondences between Angela and another woman named Sabine Kästner. Sabine’s email profile picture showed a woman about Villanelle’s own age, with striking red hair and blue eyes. Upon further inspection of the emails, the correspondence went back six months, starting out innocent and professional. The latest had been from Sabine: _When can I see you?_ That was two months ago. It was safe to say that Angela was sleeping with her.

             The ice cream parlor they end up at isn’t too far from Villanelle’s hotel. It’s the off-season, and cold, and so the place is barren. They have this in common, at least, Villanelle thinks, finding it somewhat charming how carefully Angela studies the display of different flavors, eating ice cream no matter the time of year. This woman has a spine about her, and yet little things like this reveal more than Angela probably knows.

            Villanelle learns that Angela prefers black cherry ice cream and gets it in a cone even though she doesn’t like them. They sit towards the back of the parlor, next to the vent blowing warm air. Angela isn’t exactly a talker, and the silence between them is almost comfortable. While she’s distracted, Villanelle steals glances. When she’d met Angela yesterday at an art sale—where they’d featured some of Angela’s photography—she had been dressed to the nines; today she’s a little more casual, wearing a blouse with a dark pullover sweater paired with black jeans and fashionable yet practical cold-weather boots. Her hair is brown, and in the ice cream parlor’s harsh, almost white light, the greys at Angela’s temples stand out more. Villanelle chews the end of her spoon, desire pooling suddenly, wanting to kiss Angela there, and other places. She wonders if Angela likes it gentle or if she prefers it rough. She imagines what waits for her underneath Angela’s casual clothes.

             Then Angela says, around her ice cream, “Don’t get any ideas.”

            “I wasn’t thinking anything,” says Villanelle.

            “You’ve been watching me for five minutes.” Angela finishes the ice cream that’s in her cone and sets the thing on a napkin. She starts to lick her fingers. “Surely my eating ice cream isn’t the most interesting thing in the world.”

            “It isn’t my fault you eat it so sensually.”

            “It’s your fault for thinking I do.”

            Oh, this woman’s good. Villanelle smirks, sinking into her chair. Her lemon ice cream does nothing to distract her from the increasing pressure between her thighs. Villanelle says, “You’re beautiful. Do you blame me for my thoughts?”

            Angela sighs, wiping her hands on a napkin before standing. Her chair scrapes noisily. “Yes,” she says, “and you can think about them alone.”

            She’s about to leave but Villanelle grabs her wrist—which is surprisingly thin—says, “Wait,” pulls Angela to her. “You’ve missed a spot.” She leans up and kisses her, licks Angela’s upper lip, where she’d missed a streak of black cherry ice cream. Angela bites down on Villanelle’s lower lip, enough to break skin, and there’s a glorious sting. She allows Angela to pull away, who looks slightly shocked. There’s a standstill that feels a lot like the moments in a standoff where Villanelle and her opponent are daring the other to pull their weapon first.

            “Goodnight, Ivonne,” Angela says, and leaves with hurried steps. Villanelle gives her ten seconds, licking her bleeding lip, and then she follows Angela out the doors and to the right, catching up to her easily, steering her away from the crowd with a “Oh, we aren’t done.” She leads Angela to a half-lit alley between two buildings and presses her to the side of one. “You didn’t have to bite me.”

            “You didn’t have to kiss me,” Angela counters. She sounds mad.

            “But it was good, wasn’t it?”

            Angela looks up, to the dark sky. “You’re getting ideas.”

            “Am I?” Villanelle asks softly. The heat between their bodies is cloying. It’s taking all her effort not to drag Angela back to her room. Strangely there’s a desire to be naked with her, and Villanelle doesn’t know if it’s because Angela’s resistance reminds her so much of Eve’s, or something else. “Am I the one with ideas, Angela?”

            “If I wanted you to kiss me, I would’ve asked, for fuck’s sake!” she hisses. “If I wanted you to fucking fuck me I would ask for that too!”

            “Then ask me.”

            Angela stares at her then, her breath shorter, puffing sweetly in Villanelle’s face. “What?” she says.

            “Ask me,” Villanelle murmurs. “Or are you one of those women who doesn’t know what she wants after all?”

            There’s a growl, and Angela pushes her away, enough that she can slip easily between Villanelle and the wall and oh, she could do it right here, sink to the ground in the shadow and no one would see her with her hand thrust down her pants—but Angela pauses, briefly, in the light, a clear signal. _Follow me._

            Perhaps Angela plays this well because she’d done this stealth thing before, with Sabine Kästner. She would’ve had to play her cards carefully, be sure that they parted ways innocently, made up stories. In another life, Villanelle supposes that Angela would’ve made a good spy, but in this life she isn’t cut from that cloth. Only a handful of people are.

            Angela calls them a cab and Villanelle holds the door for her, sliding in next to her. Her blood is hot and she’s starting to sweat inside her parka but there are appearances to keep, and so she keeps it on. She doesn’t put her hand on Angela’s knee, or lean to kiss her; the action would be too painful. Villanelle doesn’t feel like spiraling down that hole tonight. Instead she stares out the window, at the blurry, cold city, imagining what it would feel like to undress Angela, touch her, make her come until she has to push Villanelle away.

            When they arrive at Angela’s house, Angela is rather stony. She doesn’t talk, only enters the place like she’s had a hell of a day and wants nothing more than to chug a bottle of wine. It’s a nice house, everything updated to 2018’s modern standards, the walls decorated with artwork by artists Villanelle doesn’t know the name of. The canvases are massive and must’ve cost Angela a good chunk of money. The artwork isn’t something Villanelle would buy for her own apartment, but she appreciates Angela’s taste.

            The house is only a single story, but it’s large. Angela’s bedroom is at the back of it. The style is predominantly German but it has touches of Angela’s English roots in the furniture and the sheets and comforter that decorate the bed. The lamp she flicks on has a goldish glow and makes the room warm.

            “It suits you,” Villanelle says, breaking the long silence.

            Angela drops her camera bag and turns, stepping bravely into Villanelle’s space without warning and pushing her against the wall. “Don’t talk,” Angela says, her voice almost harsh, but the hands against Villanelle’s chest betray her, the kiss betraying her further. It’s gentle, at first, and Angela’s tongue graces the marks she’d made earlier, now scabbing over. Villanelle moans softly and opens her mouth further, pulling Angela close, perfectly content to play this role, give Angela a sense of control. She is, Villanelle admits, a very good kisser. She lets it go on for a minute, squeezes Angela’s hips, feigning submission and hearing Angela’s pleased hum, and then she walks them backwards, to the bed, spilling Angela unceremoniously onto it and straddling her.

            “Now who has ideas?” Villanelle says, a smile tugging at her lips. Angela looks beached, having survived being pulled under by a riptide and gaping at the sky. “Want to tell me any of them?”

            “No.” She pushes against Villanelle’s chest, hits her when she doesn’t budge.

            Villanelle traps her wrists, pinning them to Angela’s sides with a sigh. “Do you really think that’s going to help you?”

            “Fuck you,” Angela says, but the way her eyes keep roaming to Villanelle’s lips tells her that her heart’s not in it.

            “Is that what you’ve been thinking?” She kisses Angela gently. “Have you thought about this all night?”

            Angela says nothing for a minute, her efforts of fighting getting weaker until she slips her wrists from Villanelle’s grasp and pulls Villanelle against her by the lapels of her parka. Then, a breathless, “Take your clothes off, Ivonne.” Another kiss. “Please.”

            Villanelle pulls away, standing now. “You did ask nicely,” she says. She starts with her boots and her socks, setting them by the foot of the bed so that they’re easier to get to. She unzips her parka, tells Angela, “You too.” The parka she slings over the back of Angela’s wooden desk chair. She undresses quickly and takes pleasure in the sight of Angela’s movements stalling, the way her light brown eyes take her in before her brain catches up. The last thing Villanelle does is undo the two braids her hair has been in all evening; she puts the ponytails around her wrists.

            Angela kicks her clothes to the floor. The skin that hasn’t seen the sun is fairer, not quite as olive as the rest of her; her breasts are small, her nipples darker, already stiff from exposure to the cooler air. Villanelle licks her lips; she’ll take them into her mouth, between her teeth. She climbs back onto the bed, straddles Angela and pushes her back until they’re lying down. They share a sigh, and Angela’s lips are on hers immediately, and her hands touch Villanelle everywhere: her face, her arms, her shoulders, her breasts.

            “Is this you voicing your ideas?” Villanelle asks, and Angela groans, says, “Shut up. Just… just fuck me.”

            “Patience,” Villanelle murmurs, kissing Angela’s neck, trailing down her sternum. Angela’s hands find her hair and, when she teases a nipple, squeeze. Villanelle groans at the pain of it, the sparks settling in her gut. She slides her hand between Angela’s thighs and rewards her with soft strokes, not going inside just yet. She’s warm, here, and slick; her hips twitch desperately and Villanelle has barely done anything.

            “What are you waiting for?” Angela breathes. Her voice, the sternness of it, may work on Sabine. “Ivonne…”

            On the nightstand, Angela’s phone lights up, playing a default ringtone.

            “Fuck.”

            “Answer it,” Villanelle says.

            “What, now?”

            She withdraws her hand, and Angela moans, reaches for her phone.

            “ _Hallo?”_ she says.

            Villanelle hears another voice on the other end, airy-sounding, the German fast. She asks, “Is it Sabine?”

            Angela’s look is one of horror, but quickly melds with pleasure when Villanelle slips a finger inside her. She inhales a shaky breath. Sabine asks a question.

            “What?” Angela says, in German. “No, love, I… I just got back from… a run.” She shoves the phone underneath her pillow for a moment and hisses, “How did you know… about Sabine?”

            Villanelle curls her finger. She jerks her chin to the lump in the pillow. “Keep talking.”

            Angela takes the phone again. Her face is red, her chest heaving with the effort it takes to not give away what she’s doing. She’s talking to Sabine about school-related things, something Villanelle doesn’t really care to hear. Gently, she adds another finger, starting a rhythm, and then she puts her mouth on Angela, who quickly covers her mouth with her hand and tries to hide her moan of “Oh, god.”

            Another question from Sabine. Angela’s breathing through her nose, looking down at Villanelle.

            She hears Sabine’s question: _“Angie?”_

            “You’d better answer her,” Villanelle says.

“God, _yes_ , fine… yes, I am,” Angela says in English. “And about you—it’s a bit of bad timing… Can I—call you back—” She waits only seconds for Sabine to answer and she hangs up the call, shoving her phone clumsily away and burying both hands in Villanelle’s hair, gasping, “You shit…” She’s close already and Villanelle doubles her efforts, wanting to hear her, needing to feel her. She keeps her eyes open the entire time, despite Angela’s painful tugs on her hair making her eyes sting. Angela shouts, and for a moment her breathing stalls, and she collapses against the pillows with a half-sigh, her body twitching as Villanelle kisses gently between her thighs.

            “Oh I could _kill_ you,” Angela says between pants when Villanelle kisses back up her body.

            “I hope you mean it in the Shakespearean way,” Villanelle says. She kisses Angela’s temples, where her hair is beginning to grey.

            “Give me… five minutes and we’ll find out.”

            Villanelle kisses her while she recovers, and then, with surprising effort, Angela flips them over and sinks her teeth, again, into Villanelle’s already split lip. She groans and pulls Angela closer, wishing, for a moment, that the teeth were Eve’s—because surely, if Eve was angry enough with her, she’d express it similarly. She accepts Angela’s tongue and buries her hands in Angela’s dark hair.

            “I should make you call someone,” Angela says.

            Villanelle huffs, half a laugh. “There’s no one.”

            “Really?” A kiss to her cheek, then her neck. “Someone as beautiful as you with no girlfriend?”

            The word, of course, brings Anna to mind first, though she wouldn’t call Anna a girlfriend. They were lovers of the illicit sort, having to keep the affair in a clamshell until the night Villanelle had murdered Max, confessing to him that she’d already had his wife, and in bed. Eve comes to mind too, but Eve isn’t a girlfriend either, even if she’s this steady force in Villanelle’s life. A steady force who’d stabbed her, a steady force who is somewhere in dreary London wearing bad clothes and running on caffeine and wine and a shitty desk job.

            Villanelle says, “Nope.”

            “You’re a floater, then.”

            “We’re not talking about my personal life, Angela.” Villanelle pushes her lower, to her breasts, moaning softly when Angela takes a nipple between her teeth. “Bite it,” she says, breathless now. Angela obeys, and does the same on the other side, and then she slips her fingers inside.

            “God,” says Angela, moving back up to kiss her. “How do you like it?”

            “Act like you’re angry with me.”

            Angela smirks. “Not hard to do, considering your little trick.” She picks up the pace, makes it almost relentless, and when she buries her face in the side of her neck Villanelle closes her eyes and imagines Eve.

            When she’s close, there are almost pathetic moans escaping her lips, and she gasps, “Put your—mouth on me—” and shoves Angela clumsily between her thighs. Within two minutes she’s tumbling, and, out of revenge, she supposes, Angela builds her up to another without a rest. Villanelle curses, almost calls Angela Eve but bites her tongue at the last second. She holds Angela against her when she comes with a half-repressed shout.

 

**MADRID**

Villanelle’s hotel is on top of a baguette shop. The neon lights of its sign shine through the window at night and normally she would consider it an annoyance but after tonight’s job—another corrupt judge—she finds it appealing. The sun’s starting to set and the light is already on. Villanelle dresses in comfortable cold weather clothes, putting her still-damp hair up into a professional bun before slipping on her boots and making her way down to the lobby. She turns in her key and makes her way to the baguette shop. Even though she’s been in this hotel for two days, she hasn’t been in this particular shop. Its name is El Brillante and she’d half expected it to have a stupid slogan painted on its windows but it doesn’t. Rather unfortunate, she thinks now. Eve would probably get a kick out of it.

            The shop itself is large and its décor is a mix of modern and old-fashioned. Upon entering, she’s greeted with the smells of fresh baked bread, cheese, and roasting meat, and the sounds of workers chattering, other guests having conversations with each other, and one frustrated, nicely-dressed Englishwoman hissing into her phone. Her hair is chin-length, dark, and wavy, with streaks of grey here and there. Villanelle guesses she’s at least forty but she has a surprisingly youthful face. The woman doesn’t notice her gaze; just goes on talking. Villanelle feels an amused smile creeping onto her face. Poor thing looks like she needs something to take the edge off.

            At the order counter, she gets herself a ham and cheese baguette and a bottle of mineral water and, not knowing the woman’s tastes at all, gets her a simple cheese baguette with a royal blue bottle of water. She pays and finds herself a table near the back of the first room, eats her own baguette while she waits for the woman to get off the phone.

            “I’m on fucking vacation, Alexander,” the Englishwoman says, rather loudly, “so that means you leave me alone unless there’s something important the department wants me to know or if the fucking thing is on fire.” A pause. “Yes, interviews included. Got it?” Another pause. “Thank you. I’ll see you in a week.” She hangs up, pinches her nose, and Villanelle rises, food in hand. She approaches slowly, not wanting to startle her.

            “Excuse me,” says Villanelle, “I—”

            The woman holds up a hand. “I’m not interested in interviews.”

            “I’m not a journalist.”

            She looks up at Villanelle; her eyes are a striking green. “What do you want?” she says. “You don’t know who I am?”

            “No, I don’t.” Villanelle holds out the baguette and the water bottle. “I got you these.”

            The Englishwoman regards them for only a second before taking them with a sigh. “Thank you,” she says, already unwrapping the baguette with greedy hands. “Sit down, then, since you’re already here.”

            Villanelle takes the chair next to her and scoots it away to keep a polite distance. For someone so neat, the woman eats like she’s starving. Villanelle chews the inside of her cheek, finding it charming.

            “I’m Vanessa Thorpe,” the woman says around a mouthful. “A rather well-known professor of criminal justice.” She swallows, and then her tongue traces her top teeth. “Good choice, that one.”

            “Should I know of you?” asks Villanelle.

            “I’ve been published in several journals and also have a book out, which is why I assumed you were a journalist.” She’s regarding Villanelle now, probably taking in her clothes—her expensive but well-worn navy-blue parka, her designer brand jeans, her Doc Martens—and trying to gain a sense of what she does. Vanessa asks, “Why did you buy me these?”

            “You looked hangry.” Villanelle rises, then, zipping up her parka the rest of the way and taking her water bottle with her. “Good night,” she says, and she feels Vanessa’s eyes lingering on her as she makes her way out the shop’s double doors.

            It was enough of a conversation to get Vanessa interested in her. She likes to play this game, sometimes, leaving the woman hanging so that she questions herself more, thinks about Villanelle more. Vanessa has a sauciness about her, and a confidence too, and something about her screams more than professor of criminal justice. Probably has a psychologist background, if the way she’d studied Villanelle was a hint enough. Villanelle chews her lip while she waits for the elevator, warmth already blossoming in her gut even though she’d known Vanessa only seven minutes.

            Later, she ends up seducing her neighbor, a woman in her mid-forties from Denmark who’s leaving the next morning. She’s eager, and breathy, and Villanelle likes the way she clings to her when she comes.

 

—

Despite the cold, Villanelle stands out on her balcony, leaning over the railings to watch the people below. It’s late morning; the sun is high and she feels stir-crazy. The job had been short and quick but at least she had gotten to kneel over the judge and watch the light drain from her eyes while she’d sucked in wet gasps. But that high had faded hours ago and now the boredom is creeping in.

            Two doors down, a woman is smoking; the smell reaches Villanelle’s nose and transports her back to another life where she’d leaned over sinks listening to Konstantin and his early attempts to get to know her, of watching Anna smoke in afternoon light, satisfied and tired from sex. She coughs, and turns back inside, shutting the balcony doors behind her.

            She goes out. She finds an expensive but intimate restaurant and has a pricey seafood meal with sangria, enjoying the fruity taste, how dangerous that drink would be to someone who didn’t know their limits. She gets gelato for dessert and the waitress makes a comment, “You’re one of those people, aren’t you?” Her smile, Villanelle notices, is flirtatious, and so she flirts right back.

            “Bring me another and we’ll find out.”

            The waitress is attractive, and her hair is right up Villanelle’s alley but she’s too young. During her second cup of gelato she thinks back to Vanessa, that confidence, that edge of sauciness. She wonders if Vanessa has always been that way or if it’s a manner she’d had to adopt. Criminal justice is no fairy field. Thick skin is required, and immeasurable amounts of confidence. Would it change in the bedroom, like so many women before her? Or would she be one of those rare ones who puts up a good fight?

            _Not like Eve,_ says that voice in the back of her head. Villanelle sinks her teeth into a bite of gelato, letting the pain wash away the thought. No one is Eve Polastri except Eve Polastri. And Villanelle doesn’t want to go back to London just yet. There’s something for her to do here, perhaps another job in a day or two somewhere else where she could just fly out of Spain and to wherever she needs to go.

            Instead of taking a cab back to her hotel, Villanelle walks. The cold is needles in her cheeks and the tip of her nose but it’s nothing compared to a Parisian winter, or worse, a Russian one. She thinks of Anna at the thought of Parisian winters, which she’s well accustomed to.

            “You’d still be cold in Paris,” she’d say in a letter, if Anna were still alive to receive them, if she’d even send Anna letters at all, “but maybe you’d like it.”

            Her thoughts evaporate almost instantly when, passing by the baguette shop on the way to her hotel’s entrance, she glimpses Vanessa in the window. There’s a half-eaten baguette in front of her, as well as a cup of what may be coffee. She’s reading a thick novel, her fingers obscuring the title from Villanelle’s view. Feeling bold, Villanelle enters the shop and approaches Vanessa’s table. She says, putting on a smile, “I thought that was you.”

            Vanessa peers at her over the top of the book, looking for a moment displeased at being interrupted. “Here to buy me another sandwich?” she asks.

            “If you didn’t like the one you have.”

            Vanessa bends the corner of a page and shuts her book, shoving it into her purse before Villanelle can get a good look at the title. She says, “I am rather in a talking mood. Get yourself a coffee and we’ll sit.”

            There had been, Villanelle thinks while standing in line, a drop of impatience in her words. Villanelle also doesn’t like being interrupted during tasks, and if that’s what Vanessa’s annoyed about, it’s perfectly understandable. If it’s something deeper, she’ll take enjoyment in prying it out.

            She gets a cappuccino and brings it with her to Vanessa’s table. “Are you sure you don’t mind me sitting with you?” she asks. Vanessa shakes her head, and Villanelle sits.

            “What’s your name?” Vanessa asks.

            “Julie.”

            “Occupation?”

            “Caterer,” replies Villanelle.

            “Julie the caterer,” says Vanessa, “I’m trying to figure out your motivations.”

            Villanelle pulls her face into a puzzled mask. “How do you mean?”

            “You say you’re not a journalist but you keep approaching me.” Vanessa looks her over again, and then amusement lightens her features. “No, you don’t seem like a journalist. More a student. Are you a student?”

            “Not for a while.” School, for her, had ended on the cusp of her nineteenth birthday.

            “Must not be fond of that life, then.”

            “I like my job,” Villanelle says. “It allows me to talk to interesting people.” She knows, by now, that the look in her eyes is suggestive and hopes Vanessa picks up on it. “What are you doing in Spain, Vanessa?” she asks.

            “Vacation,” Vanessa replies, raising her coffee cup to her lips. “I wanted to take time off from the department and before I go on another damn lecture tour. Have a little fun.”

            Villanelle perks up at the words. “You don’t like your job?”

            “I do. It’s the administrative work that kills.” She finishes the rest of her coffee and points a finger at Villanelle. “If you go into teaching, don’t also become head of a department.”

            “I won’t teach,” Villanelle says, smiling. Unless it’s teaching Eve how to properly handle a gun.

            “I’m going to get another coffee,” Vanessa says.

            The lunch crowd is starting to filter in, and Villanelle’s phone vibrates in her pocket just as the shop fills with noise. She glances back at the line before pulling her phone out and answering it. “You’re calling at a funny time.”  

            Her newest handler, Imelda, says, _“During your downtime, I hope.”_

“I’m trying to have fun.”

            _“How was the job?”_

“Quick,” replies Villanelle. “Are you calling me because there is another?”

            _“You’re supposed to be on your way back to Paris.”_

Villanelle clicks her tongue, chews the inside of her cheek. “That isn’t what you told me before.”

            _“I don’t make the rules, Villanelle,”_ Imelda reminds her.

            Villanelle sighs, looks back at Vanessa, who is ordering another cup of coffee at the counter. She tells Imelda, “I want an extension.”

            _“Why?”_

“I’m chasing something,” Villanelle replies, and hangs up before Imelda can say anything else. She wants, suddenly, to ask Vanessa back, to kiss her, have her in bed, but something tells her to wait.

            When Vanessa comes back they talk a little of her life and her teaching, and then, after half-finishing her second cup of coffee, Vanessa gathers up her belongings. “I enjoyed talking to you, Julie,” she says, “but I think I’d like to be alone now.”

            “All right,” says Villanelle, and Vanessa leaves without another word.

 

            She collapses against the pillows with a loud sigh, legs still trembling, sweat sticking the sheets to her skin. Villanelle shuts her eyes, fantasies of Eve and Vanessa fading as the aftershocks wear off. Waiting for Vanessa to make a move would mean Villanelle would be in Madrid longer than she’d like to be. Not that the city is ghastly by any means. It just isn’t Paris. She decides that, tomorrow, she’ll ask Vanessa to come back to this room with her. As for Eve… Well. That can come later, when she’s feeling more spontaneous.

           

—

The next day, a Thursday, Villanelle spends most of the morning and afternoon visiting all the tourist sights: famous buildings, museums, art galleries, the like. The near-mindlessness of it keeps her occupied but before long, in another art gallery where she’s gazing at a Goya over the tops of heads, she thinks of Eve. Wonders if she would like this place, which paintings she’d be drawn to—Goya’s dancers or Dali’s strange, surreal clocks?—or if she’d find it all boring and want to do something else, go back to the hotel and pass the afternoon hours with sex until it was dinner.

            “I’m hungry now,” she’d say from the other side of the bed, and Villanelle would sit up with a groan and tell her, “I know somewhere you’d like.”

            She goes to dinner, takes the imagined version of Eve with her, drinks champagne with both the meal and dessert. Later, when the sun has left darkness, she finds herself sitting in El Brillante’s window table without entirely knowing why, only that she wants company and is determined for it to be Vanessa. She nurses a coffee, wraps her hands around the hot mug to keep them warm. Her leg bounces restlessly. She knows that, to the people here, she appears as someone who has just gotten off work, changed into more comfortable clothes, and is having a reprieve, maybe waiting for a friend. It seems that hours pass before she glimpses Vanessa emerging from the back room, tucking her phone into her pocket. Villanelle turns to the window, pretends not to have seen her.

            “I guess it’s me running into you now, isn’t it?” Vanessa says. She’s wearing a thinner wool coat that’s seen better days, and a satchel over her left shoulder. “Where have you come from?”

            “Work,” replies Villanelle. “It was a wedding this time.”

            “Hate those things. May I?” Vanessa gestures to the chair across from Villanelle.

            “Please. Let me get you a coffee.”

            “Oh, that won’t be necessary. I’ve had four trying to take care of department business.” She sets the satchel on the ground. “It’s always up in shambles when the head leaves. Like they don’t know how to fend for themselves. Little children, I’d say.”

            “You seem a little sour,” Villanelle says, letting a slight drop of disappointment color her voice. “Would something stronger than coffee cheer you up?”

            “I suppose,” Vanessa says after a moment, “if you’re buying.”

            Villanelle smiles. “Let’s get out of here.”

            They only have to walk around the corner to get to the hotel’s lobby. Villanelle fetches her key from the front desk and leads Vanessa to her room.

            “I wasn’t aware you were travelling,” Vanessa says in the elevator. Is that surprise in her voice, or suspicion?

            “I must not have mentioned it.”

            “Where are you from originally?”

            “Paris,” replies Villanelle, “but I’ve lived other places.”

            “Yeah,” says Vanessa thoughtfully, “I thought so. You’re living there still, then?”

            “You’re starting to sound like an investigator, Vanessa.” The elevator doors open and Villanelle gestures for Vanessa to exit first. Together they walk down the corridor, Villanelle thinking of the bottle of champagne in her fridge and how best to get Vanessa to stop asking questions. Get her in bed. Or on the loveseat. Or whatever surface is closest when the desire becomes too much.

            Inside, Villanelle pops the champagne’s cork while Vanessa admires the view from the French doors that lead to the balcony.

            “How much do you want?” Villanelle questions.

            “Half a glass. You know,” Vanessa says, “I’m a little surprised you can afford this, Julie.”

            “They pay me well.”

            “I wouldn’t think so, unless your catering company is private, which doesn’t seem like a possible thing.”

            Villanelle’s grip tightens slightly on the neck of the bottle. Why the sudden raise in hackles? she wonders, taking as silent a deep breath as she can. “Perhaps tips have something to do with it.” She pours her own drink, sets the bottle aside, and carries both glasses over to the French doors.

            “Or inheritance.” Vanessa accepts her drink, sips it cautiously, and when she takes the glass away from her lips Villanelle admires the lipstick left behind. “You do seem the type, now that I think about it.”

            “Oh?” says Villanelle, raising her eyebrows. “I may say the same about you but rich people usually replace their coats when they get to a state like yours.”

            Vanessa smiles. “Yes, you’re right. But…” And she goes into a little spiel about profiling and patterns and matching people to those patterns, which Villanelle listens to with half an ear—she’d learned this ages ago—draining her glass quickly, going back to get another one.

            “…and then you discover that people aren’t all that different—”

            “I want to fuck you,” Villanelle says. Vanessa fixes her with a bewildered stare. Villanelle continues, “You said you were trying to figure out my motivations, well, that’s my motivation.” And, sensing a change in the air, she lets her glass drop to the floor and cups Vanessa’s face in her hands and kisses her. Vanessa kisses back but her body is stiff.

            “Oh, that is rich,” Vanessa says when they part, and a chuckle escapes, not exactly a happy one. “Real fucking rich. You get to know me only because you want to fuck me.”

            “Is that really such a bad thing?” Villanelle runs her thumb over Vanessa’s lip and swears Vanessa wants to bite it clean off. “I remember you saying you wanted to _have some fun._ ”

            “I had interest in you.”

            “You still do.” Villanelle kisses her again and this time Vanessa isn’t as stiff. She buries her fingers in the cloth of Villanelle’s parka, fists it. “Are you angry about that?”

            Vanessa’s glass drops next and both her hands are in Villanelle’s hair, squeezing painfully. “I’m angry that you think you can do this.”

            “But it’s working.” Villanelle smiles. “Isn’t it?”

            Another rough kiss, and Vanessa’s teeth sink into her lip, almost hard enough to draw blood. Villanelle groans at the pain, at the spike that goes straight between her thighs. She breathes, “I like a woman who fights,” and pushes them both towards the bedroom. Undressing is clumsy and quick, spread about the bedroom like they’d clawed out of them. She pushes Vanessa back into the pillows, straddles a thigh, explores her with kisses, beginning from her neck. Vanessa’s pulse is rabbitty ender her lips. Fingernails dig into Villanelle’s bare shoulders, like Vanessa wants to either push her between her thighs or off the bed completely.

            “Should I bother to ask what you like?” Villanelle asks.

            “Take a wild guess.”

            It isn’t exactly quick but it’s rough, almost angry; Vanessa’s nails leave scratches between Villanelle’s shoulder blades and her hands tug hard enough to rip hair out by the roots when she comes, once, twice, three times…

            “Bite me,” Villanelle breathes later, grinding against Vanessa’s thigh, fingers gripping Vanessa’s hair.

            “Where?”

            “Anywhere…”

            Teeth sink into her earlobe, the curve of her shoulder, her nipple, back to the other shoulder and then she’s tumbling hard, caught in a wave, washed ashore and barely holding herself up over a just as breathless Vanessa, whose cheeks are flushed, whose eyes are closed. It was good, Villanelle realizes, swallowing, finding strength to collapse on the cold side of the bed. Very good. Angry sex usually is. Especially with Eve.

            Eve, she thinks, sighing. You should meet me.

            Eventually Villanelle asks, “Satisfied?”

            Vanessa shifts, gets out of bed, finds her clothes, saying nothing. But her jaw is set.

            “What?” asks Villanelle. “Are you having regrets?” She gets up too and pulls on her clothes. “You can take the champagne if you like. Makes emotions a little more muted.”

            “Come here,” Vanessa says, and Villanelle thinks that, perhaps, Vanessa is one of those women who secretly likes soft things, soft kisses after rough sex, someone to caress and tuck her hair behind her ears and send her gently off. So she approaches slowly, reaches out to touch her, but, unexpectedly, Vanessa strikes her, with a sure palm, right in the nose. There’s a crack, an eruption of pain. Villanelle yells, cups her hand underneath it as the first drops of scarlet emerge, Vanessa flinging her satchel over her shoulder, going to the door, escaping. It slams shut.

            Her nose properly streaming blood, Villanelle growls, stomps to the entrance and wrenches open the hotel door and shouts, down the corridor and to Vanessa’s quickly retreating back, “I HOPE YOUR JOB GOES TO HELL!”

            Blind with fury, she scrambles around the bathroom and finds a hand towel and presses it gingerly to her nose. The pain is terrible. The sight of blood on cloth reminds her of her attempts to staunch the bleeding from her stab wound. She wants to hit something, kill someone, Vanessa even, bleed all over her while she strangles her with two hands. But she does no such thing. She forces calm, finds her phone, looks up doctors and uses her employers’ software to find addresses. She settles on one Katherine Iverson, from Yorkshire but doing residency here, gets her phone number and tracks her cell. She lives in an apartment complex twenty minutes away by cab. She only has time to grab her USP compact from her suitcase before she storms downstairs.

            Once at Katherine Iverson’s apartment, Villanelle breaks in, still holding her hand towel. She pulls her gun and walks into the kitchen, from which two voices float. Katherine Iverson and her friend—or lover or whatever the other woman is—gasp when they catch sight of her, their faces paling visibly.

            “Hello Dr. Iverson,” says Villanelle, in English. “I need your assistance.”

            Katherine points at the gun, stammers, “I-it’s not loaded…”

            Villanelle cocks the hammer back. “Now it is. You need to fix my nose.” Katharine doesn’t move. Villanelle sighs, “Don’t make this difficult.”

            “Kathy,” says her friend, “d-do what she wants…”

            “Okay. Okay. Come t-to the back.” Katharine leaves the kitchen, leads Villanelle to the bathroom. It’s a small space, just big enough for two people.

            “Try anything funny,” Villanelle warns, sitting down on the closed toilet, “I shoot you. Your friend tries anything, she gets brass too.”

            Katharine nods furiously, a trembling bobblehead searching underneath the sink for bandages and other things.

            “You have something strong to drink?” Villanelle asks.

            “Al-Alcohol isn’t very advisable—”

            “Fuck advisable. What do you have?”

            “V-Vodka.”

            “That’ll do.”

            “Camila,” Katharine says, “please get the vodka.” She sets a tin of bandages on the sink. Her friend comes back with a bottle a minute later, handing it over, trembling just as hard as Katharine.

            “Stand where I can see you,” Villanelle tells Camila. “Right in the doorway.” Camila obeys, her head pointed downwards, at her bare feet. She uncocks her gun, sets it on the countertop within reach and takes the bottle of vodka from Katharine, unscrews the cap, and takes two hearty gulps. “Shall we continue, Dr. Iverson?”

            “I’m going to have to… reset your nose,” Katharine says, washing her hands. “Then I’ll pack and s-splint it. That’ll have to stay on f-for a while.” She procures small tools from the tin, a nasal speculum and specialty things that Villanelle doesn’t know the name of.

            “I have a while.” She takes another swig of vodka and sets the bottle down. She crumples her bloodied hand towel into her fist to have something to squeeze. “Make it quick.”

            Katharine nods. She stands in front of Villanelle, shifts to get a good angle, nasal speculum in hand. She says, “This would be easier w-with local injections—”

            “Make it quick,” Villanelle repeats.

            The procedure takes twenty minutes. Despite her obvious fear, Katharine manages to steady her hands. With each pained groan from Villanelle she whispers an apology. At last she packs Villanelle’s nose and applies a splint. By the end of it, Villanelle is sweating and breathing hard.

            “Deep breaths,” Katharine says. “I’m… gonna write you an antibiotic prescription.”

            “Sure you’re allowed to do that?” Villanelle questions.

            “No, but it’s what’s best.”

            Villanelle downs more vodka while she waits. She’ll have bruising around her eyes. Imelda will ask her what happened.

            “Here.” Katharine hands her a thin slip of paper. “Take it to a-a pharmacist.”

            Villanelle tucks it into her pants pocket. She takes her gun and the bottle of vodka, shoving past both Katharine and Camila to get back to the front of the apartment. She turns around, tells them, “I’m taking the vodka with me.” They both nod. Then she asks, “Are you two together?” More nods. “You have a good woman in your life, Camila.” And with that, she leaves.

 

**BRIGHTON**

Despite the throbbing in her nose, Villanelle feels good. Not moments ago, she’d had Eve on the phone and asked if she could come to Brighton. It’d taken only a small amount of convincing. “You know you want to see me, Eve,” she’d said, and after a frightfully long pause, Eve said, “When?”

            Eve will be here in a few hours. The good feeling Villanelle has is not unlike the one that precedes a kill; there’s a calmness but an anxiousness, her fingers and arms, her whole body, aching for something, a kind of release. There is, she notes, excitement too. She doesn’t know what sort of mood Eve will be in. Half of her hopes it’s a good mood that’ll allow them to talk civilly but another half wants it to be volatile, something she can soothe with kisses and caresses. She doesn’t exactly know what’s happened in Eve’s life since she’d last seen her, too busy travelling and killing and sleeping with a handful of other people. She only knows that Eve’s leash has been extended by just a few meager inches.

            The hotel that she’s in is on the cheaper side, by her standards, and if she stands on tiptoes she can see a little bit of the sea shining in the distance. She’d sat on the shore just a few hours earlier, soaking in the salty air and the sliver of sunlight slipping through building clouds and eating a lemon crème ice cream. What people were walking there took notice of her bandaged nose, eyed it curiously, but said nothing. Probably figured she was in some sort of rough sport and broke it that way. A trace of the salt still lingers on her skin despite her efforts of scrubbing it out in the bath.

            After a minute, she can’t sit still. Villanelle decides she’ll walk for a little bit, clear her head, try to see where she’ll take Eve to dinner. She puts on a parka and a scarf and thicker but well-worn boots and makes her way out.

            Outside, the clouds have dissipated somewhat but there are still wisps floating, like strips from cotton balls. A surprisingly clear night. The air, though, is heavy with its usual humidity, and Villanelle finds herself wondering if Eve’s hair tolerates it. She smiles at the thought of _Probably not._

            Villanelle walks through The Lanes, narrow pathways between colorful buildings crowded with just-emerging nightlife and leading to shops and cafés and little seafood restaurants. Multi-colored, handwritten signs advertise specials. _Homemade crab chowder. Delicious lentil soup. House-baked bread!_ She can imagine Eve here, sitting outside at the tables if the weather were warmer, unburdened, willing to talk.

            “Why Brighton?” she’d ask.

            “Figured you were tired of London,” Villanelle would reply. “Didn’t want you purchasing a plane ticket, either.”

            She stays out for almost an hour and twilight is falling just as she’s walking through the doors to the lobby. She half-expects Eve to be waiting by her hotel door but the hallway is empty save for someone wheeling back a room service cart. Back in her room, Villanelle helps herself to a glass of champagne and sits with it in bed, wondering if Eve had bailed after all—

            _Rap rap rap._

She smiles.

            When she opens the door, Eve stands there, hair almost windblown, slightly out of breath, wearing a black peacoat over a grey-blue work outfit. Eve’s mouth opens and closes several times and, after Villanelle raises her eyebrows, she manages, “What—What happened to your nose?”

            “Feisty target,” replies Villanelle easily. “Had a boxing background, if you can believe it.”

            “I’m surprised someone got a fist in at all.”

            “Says the woman who nearly killed me.” She invites Eve in and she enters, looking hesitant with her hands buried in her pockets. “You want a drink?”

            “Sure.”

            “I have champagne but I can get you something else.”

            “No,” Eve says, “champagne’s fine.” She’s walking around the room, taking in the view, the furniture, the wrinkled bed with Villanelle’s own champagne glass sitting on the nightstand. “Where was this target?” Eve asks.

            “Budapest,” Villanelle lies, pouring Eve’s drink. “Have you ever been there?”

            “I haven’t been to a lot of the places you’ve mentioned.”

            “Would you like to?”

            Eve scoffs, and it turns into a chuckle of disbelief. “Let me quit my job and tell them I’m running off with the assassin I might have killed. Thank you,” Eve adds, accepting her drink, going to the window with it. Villanelle admires her in the evening light, the little halo around her hair, her crossed arms.

            “You’re a dreamer, Eve,” Villanelle says. “Don’t tell me you wouldn’t want to tour Europe with me.”

            “It’s an insane idea.”

            “But you’re not saying no.”

            Eve sighs. It sounds like an _I wish_ sigh. She’s silent for a minute, drinking, staring out the window. Then she says, “I’m going to warm up,” setting her glass down on the coffee table and heading for the bathroom.

            “You want to do dinner when you’re done?”

            “As long as you’re paying.”

            Villanelle scoffs. Of course she’ll pay for Eve’s dinner. She’ll pay for whatever Eve wants. She sits on the uncomfortable loveseat, the bathroom door cracked, showing a glimpse of mirror and within it the reflection of the tile above the tub. She hears faucets being turned on, hears Eve’s shoes clatter to the floor, hears the rustle of clothes as she takes them off. It may be an excuse to warm up but it’s also an opportunity to get a little more time to herself. The last time Villanelle had seen her—about a month and a half ago, when the weather was warmer—Eve had retreated like this too. It’d been after sex, when the bliss had obviously worn off and Eve was fidgeting. Villanelle had told her she wasn’t going to hurt her. Eve had responded with a breathy, “I know. I just… I need a minute.”

            Is it so strange to be with me, Villanelle thinks, when we have no aim of hurting each other anymore? And perhaps it is. Many things have shifted, including their relationship. The cat-and-mouse is still there but it’s background. If anything, it behaves almost like an affair, even though Eve is now divorced and living alone and Villanelle’s only devotion is work. It’s the planning and the meeting and the hours of sex and the dinners and the walks, all ending when one of them is called back into normalcy. If they were to somehow hop across Europe together, would that end?

            “Come with me,” Eve had said once, brandishing a weapon she didn’t know how to use. “Just you and me.”

            “This is what you wanted, Eve,” Villanelle would say. They’d be on a train somewhere, travelling from one country to the next, their luggage stored above them, the landscape blurring. “Just you and me.”

            Villanelle isn’t necessarily a believer in ‘the right time,’ but perhaps that’s what all this is. There is no right time. No opportunity to slip away, become anonymous, indulge Eve in everything she’s missed out on. There are only dreams, hopeful sayings. Is it part of being an adult? Having no time to do the things you really want? Or is it just the way of the world? The way their lives are structured? Villanelle can drop everything and vanish but Eve isn’t rewarded with the same luxury. She has ties. And friends. Would she really give it all up?

            There’s a splash, wrenching Villanelle from her thoughts; she glimpses Eve’s shoulder in the mirror, then her breasts, and then tiles. Warmth blossoms. She wants to go in there, kiss Eve, press her body to Eve’s wet one, but she knows better than to interrupt a ritual. She fetches her glass from the bedroom instead and drinks the rest of its contents while she waits for Eve to reemerge, fingertips running idly over the inside of a jean-clad thigh.

 

            “Get the crab,” Villanelle suggests. They’re inside a cozy seafood restaurant, packed in with the dinner crowd. “It has good reviews.”

            “Do you look on Yelp for these things?”

            “I read. But word-of-mouth works well enough too.” Villanelle sets her menu aside, leans back in her chair. “If you don’t want the crab, you can steal bites of mine.”

            There’s a twitch at the corner of Eve’s mouth, something that would’ve been a smile, had she been in a better mood. The mask on her face is one of many emotions, one Villanelle identifies as confusion, but also of someone lost in thought. Maybe, thinks Villanelle, looking back through the drinks just to have something to do, she wishes she would’ve stayed behind, soaked in the bath, and let Villanelle dine on her own.

            “How’s work?” Eve asks, so suddenly that Villanelle can only say, “What?” Processing the question at last, she replies, “You’re asking about boring things.”

            “Yes,” says Eve, “being an international assassin must be very boring.”

            “Why else would I get creative with my kills?” She’d said it with a shrug. “It keeps things exciting for both of us. Gives you a little break from your dull work.”

            “I never said it’s dull.”

            “You show it, you know,” Villanelle tells her, lowering her voice. “You’re not as perky as when I was your only job.” Eve’s eyes fall away, looking to the corner of their table, or at the floor. A waiter comes by before either of them can say anything else, asking for orders. Villanelle tells him, “The crab for me, with your best white wine; a gin and tonic for her and… what were you having, Eve?”

            “Smoked salmon,” Eve replies.

            “Why do you look scared to be here, Eve?” Villanelle asks when a long silence has passed. “You know I’m past wanting to hurt you.” Eve swallows, but says nothing. Villanelle continues, “I want you to tell me things, Eve.”

            “What things?” Eve manages. “My work is—is dull, completely uninteresting—and you’d call it amateurish anyway, if I were to indulge you—and you already know about my wrecked home life and, and…” She takes a breath, as if breathing would get the words out better, but more don’t come. Not even after their drinks arrive. Not even when dinner is before them and they’re picking it apart.

            “Here,” Villanelle says, trying to break the silence that’s beginning to grind her teeth, proffering her plate to Eve, “have some crab. It’s quite buttery.”

            Eve plucks half a cracked leg from the plate, picks the tender white meat from inside it and takes a small, experimental bite. Chews. Swallows. “Yeah, it’s good.” She scrapes the inside of the leg with her fork even though there’s hardly any meat left in it. “Why do you want me to tell you things?”

            “Two-way street,” replies Villanelle, taking a sip of white wine. “I tell you things, you tell me things. Fair game.”

            Eve slides a large piece of salmon around on her plate, dragging it through spices and sauce. “Sometimes,” says Eve softly, “there’s a sense of shame that comes with being with you. Shame because…” Eve trails off, her brows knitting together.

            “Because what, Eve?” A pause. “Say it.”

            “Because it’s good. It _feels_ good, and it’s fucking terrible.”

            Duality, Villanelle realizes. A sense of fighting with two sides of herself. She’d seen it before, with Anna and her two lives before they’d come crashing down as one, and though Eve also has a double life, this is more about feelings and expectations and the old Eve and the new Eve. Those two sides were very different, showing themselves at different times. Old Eve was in front of her, nervous, scared. New Eve showed herself in bed, both under and on top of Villanelle, or when they were doing other things, like discussing the latest kill. But the presence of Old Eve makes Villanelle reach out, and before she knows or fully realizes it, she’s grasped Eve’s hand. Eve stiffens visibly at the touch, jaw setting, and for a moment there are acid moths fluttering in Villanelle’s chest but then, like a miracle, Eve softens, and traces Villanelle’s thumb with her own.

 

            Back at the hotel, Villanelle gets Eve another glass of champagne, at Eve’s request. For a while they do nothing but stand in the sitting room, the air shifting, Eve looking out the window at the buildings, the people passing by on sidewalks.

            “Was it really a target that broke your nose?” Eve asks.

            “Yes,” replies Villanelle.

            “Will I be hearing about this target?”

            “Eventually.” Villanelle wonders how long she can keep this game up.

            Eve’s shoulders rise and fall with a deep breath. She says, quite softly, “Tell me what you really want. No games, no—no lies.”

            “Is that why you came?” Villanelle steps to Eve, hovering behind her. “For me to tell you things?” But she reminisces on Eve’s statement, going through her wants like catalogued index cards. She puts a hand on Eve’s waist and drags her into an embrace, setting her chin on Eve’s shoulder. (This close to her, Villanelle realizes that, while she’d been in the bath, Eve had used the hotel’s standard-issue soap.) “To pleasure you,” she murmurs, and finds that she can’t say anything else. She presses a kiss to the corner of Eve’s mouth. Eve turns in her arms, kisses her full on the mouth, her champagne glass falling to the carpet when she cups Villanelle’s face in her small hands.

            Their kisses have hardly ever been soft. They’re hurried, filled with lust and teeth, each wanting to take take take from the other, and so Villanelle revels this, even though she knows Eve is just being careful of her broken nose.

            “Sure you can do this?” Eve asks quietly.

            “Eve Polastri,” whispers Villanelle, “I am not out of commission because of a stupid broken nose. I have hands.” She squeezes Eve’s hips for proof, making her gasp. “Don’t be considerate with me.”

            Eve places a hand against her sternum and Villanelle walks backwards to the bedroom, sitting heavily on the bed, Eve practically scrambling into her lap, boots and all. The next kisses are hungry and she runs her hands from Eve’s shoulders and down her arms, up her thighs and to the backs of them, sliding her hands into her pockets, squeezing. Eve groans, her fingers digging into Villanelle’s parka-covered shoulders.

            “Take your clothes off,” Eve rasps.

            Villanelle bites back a moan. “You sound nice like this,” she says. Eve leaves her lap to unzip her boots; Villanelle mourns the loss of her warmth and her lips. She shrugs off her parka first, tosses it towards the desk chair, tugs her sweater over her head, rids herself of her expensive jeans and everything else. She settles against the pillows, watching Eve struggle out of her coat and her work jacket. Then she climbs back into Villanelle’s lap, fully clothed. She cups Eve’s face, kisses her deeply and tells her, “Do what you want, Eve. I’ll take anything.”

            Eve sits back on her knees and looks about the room for a span of seconds and then looks down at her belt, her brows knitting together as an idea forms. She undoes it, slides it from its loops, and places the warm leather experimentally against Villanelle’s wrists.

            “Yes,” Villanelle says, breathless. “Loop it first—”

            “I know how to tie knots,” Eve says, but does as she’s told.

            “Don’t tell me you were in Girl Scouts.” Soon her arms are above her head and Eve has bound her wrists to the headboard. The loops are loose enough that she can move her hands a little.

            Eve shakes her head. “Never was.”

            “A sailor, then.”

            “An absurd guess.” Eve kisses her again.

            “Let me feel you,” Villanelle says.

            “You said I could do what I want,” Eve says, her face a mix of amused, wanting, and nervousness. But she affords Villanelle a small luxury, removing her shirt and pants. She likes watching Eve undress as much as she likes seeing her naked; somehow, seeing her partially unclothed is much more intimate. And she especially likes the way Eve minimally explores her body, how eager she is just to get straight to it. Her lips trace her collarbones, travel too quickly over her breasts—she wishes Eve would bite her nipples—devote a little time to the insides of her thighs. It’s there Eve bares her teeth and she moans, tugs against her bindings. God she wants to bury her hands in Eve’s inky hair and the frustration of not being able to sends a fresh wave of heat through her body.

            There’ll be bruises in the morning, shaped like teeth. She’ll make Eve press them if there’s a morning after, or press them herself while she recalls tonight’s details.

            At last Eve gets her mouth on her and Villanelle presses into her. Eve spreads a hand over a hip, fingers digging in, slipping others inside and Villanelle throws her head back, moaning, gasping, “Yes, Eve…” She hadn’t seen this coming. Sex between them is almost inevitable unless one or both of them is far too tired from work. And she’s surrendered herself to Eve but never with bound hands. She can’t help but ask, “Have you… imagined this?”

            “Several times,” Eve replies, breathless. She crawls back up, rhythm stalling for only a moment, and kisses her. All Villanelle can do to drag Eve closer to her is wrap her legs around her. It makes Eve gasp against her mouth, like she’s thinking Villanelle has killed someone like this. (She hasn’t, but she’ll let Eve have her imaginings.)

            “Eve,” she whispers, “put your mouth on me again.”

            Eve only hums. The rhythm is faster now, the ministrations harder, and Eve is panting right into her ear. It’s too much, it’s wonderful. She strangles her restraints when orgasm hits, arching into Eve, gasping, collapsing with a sigh. In her state of uselessness Eve kisses over her, exploring, coaxing aftershocks. She sinks her teeth gently into the mark she’s already made on Villanelle’s thigh and Villanelle looks down at her, says, “Get me out of these.”

            “I like you like that,” Eve counters, all playfulness, but Villanelle detects the seriousness.

            “This is the closest you’ll ever get to locking me up,” Villanelle muses, “so savor it now.”

            “Don’t worry,” she crawls up again, undoes the knots she’d made, “I will.”

            When she’s free, Villanelle rolls them over, savoring Eve’s spread hair across the pillows, cupping her face. “Do you remember what you said when we had tea?” she asks.

            “We’ve never had tea.”

            “You pointed a gun at me.”

            Eve’s face melts into a mask of realization and something else. “I… I said ‘Just you and me.’”

            “Would you come away with me?”

            “I don’t—I don’t know.”

            “Think on it,” Villanelle says, sliding lower over her, “while I keep you occupied.” She kisses Eve’s body gently but devours her in the way that has Eve shouting, trembling, coming until she uses what strength she has left to push Villanelle away with a breathless “You insatiable bastard.”

            For a long while there is nothing but silence and the world of Brighton leaks through the bedroom window: car honks, people whooping or shouting, tires on pavement that, when they drive by, sound like the sea.

            “If I said yes—and that’s a _very_ hypothetical if,” Eve says suddenly, “—where would we go?”

            “Anywhere you wanted.”

            Eve is silent for a long time and Villanelle is afraid she’s fallen asleep. But then, so softly she almost doesn’t hear it, “Let’s do it.”


End file.
